Tag Archives: Konami

When we look back 20 years from now, the first decade of the 21st century will look obvious to us, like a paint-by-numbers drawing for kids. It’s almost incalculable how many little triggers have shaped our current place in the games race. But there more than a handful of events, dozens of key games, and entire years that pushed this one-time cottage industry into the full-blown billion dollar industry it is now. While this isn’t the definitive historical account of single thing that happened between the years 2000 and 2009, this Decade in Review is an insider’s look at what happened. See “Part 2 of The Decade in Review: Videogames 2000-2009” here.

The End of an Era

The decade started with a tumultuous bang. After the Sega Dreamcast roared into the world’s consciousness on September 9, 1999, breaking sales records, introducing online gaming to consoles, and introducing David (Visual Concepts) to Goliath (Madden), the Japanese hardware maker shocked everyone again in 2001 by declaring its console was kaput.

Perhaps more remarkable was that Nintendo’s biggest competitor in the 1990s, the creator of Sonic the Hedgehog, and EA’s biggest partner, was re-focusing its energies to become a “console agnostic” software producer, meaning Sonic and his pals would appear side by side with Nintendo’s mascot, Mario. To the gaming world, this was like Bill Clinton announcing he was Republican, Bill Gates admitting he stole the Mac’s operating system, or saying you didn’t really like The Empire Strikes Back–all of it anathema.

Sony’s Big Empty PS2 Launch

Sony Computer Entertainment American launched the black, asymmetrical, and interesting (it was neither beautiful nor ugly, it just kinda “was”) PlayStation 2 in Japan in spring 2000 with lots of Sony-built hype, but few significant games to back it up (Tekken Tag Tournament and Ridge Racer V just didn’t cut it). The even bigger North American launch was amazing in that it packed 28-launch titles, only two of which were truly memorable, Madden NFL 2001 and SSX (originally proposed as a Dreamcast game). Sony scrambled to get 1 million consoles to the US, some flying on planes at the last minute.

Sony’s Stunning 2001 Line-Up

So while Sony’s launch year was a bust in many regards, replete with lots of faulty aliasing and sketchy titles, Sony (and its partners) made plans for 2001. Sony’s fall 2001 PS2 line-up was remarkable, perhaps the greatest line-up of a single system ever. In many ways it secured Sony’s first-place spot in that console generation. In the fall 2001, Sony and its partners launched Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Ico, Final Fantasy X, Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, Grand Theft Auto III, Onimusha, Red Faction, Gran Turismo 3: A-spec, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3, Devil May Cry, SSX Tricky, Twisted Metal Black (which admittedly came out in the summer), Jak and Daxter, NBA Street, Klonoa: Lunatea’s Veil, Half-Life, Silent Hill 2, and Midnight Club, among many others. The knock-out punch was thought to be Metal Gear Solid, but in fact in was Grand Theft Auto III, which swept the message boards and radio waves, and became the PS2’s exclusive killer app for the next four years.

September 11, 2001

The al-Qaeda-backed hijacking that led to the destruction of four commercial airlines and the devastation of the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers in New York affected the entire world. In the video game business, publishers with games based in New York, removed the Twin Towers from the skyline of their games (i.e. Spider-Man 2). The grim repercussions stole the industry’s light step, killing four-day PR stunts and junkets (some of which were too long and crazy, anyway), forcing marketers to edit creative use of violent language, and heightening American’s fears of Middle Eastern religious groups, the subject of which would appear in games to come.

Grand Theft Auto III Steals the Show

Grand Theft Auto III launches; and with it Rockstar Games brings a whole new way of looking at game design, game production, and a maturing gaming audience. GTA III brought open-world gaming–sandbox design–to the forefront of game development, but it was Rockstar’s magic touch of high-cost development, mature themes, good story-telling, enormous geography, stellar, hand-picked soundtracks, and most importantly, humor–that parodied American civic life–that made the Grand Theft Auto series so revolutionary, not to mention one of the best selling series of all time. Activision, Midway, and several other companies tried their best to imitate it, but between 2001 and 2005, none came close. Pandemic’s Mercenaries, Vivendi’s Scarface, and Activision’s Spider-Man 2 came in at a distant second.

Halo Captures a Generation

When Microsoft entered the videogame business in 2001, it tried buying developers across the world. Its big catch was Bungie Studios, which was in development with the first-person shooter Halo (originally for the Mac). With Halo, Bungie revolutionized FPSs on the consoles. The Halo franchise won over millions and millions of college students who spent endless nights playing linked systems and Master Chief strangely displaced a generation of confused, lone college women. The Halo franchise went on to break previous opening day retail sales records and remain the number one selling game on Xbox during its four-year life-cycle.

2001: Titus Acquires Interplay

French publisher Titus Interactive, best known for its phenomenal failure, Superman 64, completes its acquisition Interplay. French gamers are oblivious. American RPG fans openly weep across the nation.

2002: Square and Disney Raise a Kingdom

In 2002, after navigating high-level political discussions and crashing into license cul-de-sacs, Square demonstrated its creative genius again with its fully licensed Disney action-RPG, Kingdom Hearts. One part Final Fantasy (without being Final Fantasy), and the rest a bamboozling assortment of Disney characters, Kingdom Hearts, up until the recent Batman Arkham Asylum–became the pinnacle of innovative licensed work.

In one of the biggest mergers in Japanese game history, Square, makers of the popular Final Fantasy franchise, and Enix, makers of the Dragon Quest franchise, join in holy matrimony. The new company is called Square Enix, and its formation has as much to do with the crumbling Japanese economy and staying solvent as anything else. Years after this merger, Square will make yet another purchase of note.

September 12, 2003: Valve Launches Steam
Valve’s digital distribution platform, Steam, might have launched in September 2003, but it wouldn’t be until Half-Life 2 released in 2004 and third parties joined the party in 2007 that Steam gained traction and reached profitability. By carrying big third-party companies such as Eidos, Capcom, and Id Software, and seeing financial successes with The Orange Box, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and BioShock, Steam took the leadership role in digital distribution.

December 8, 2003: Black Day, Indeed

Interplay lays off the Black Isle Studios staff.A spat of former Black Isle staff members bitterly recalls the final days of their studio’s collapse. American RPG fans walk off cliffs, in front of cars, into the mouths of sharks.

September 1, 2004: Acclaim (Finally) Calls it Quits

One of the oldest publishers in the arcade and video game business, and makers of titles Shadowman, Burnout, NFL Quarterback Club, WWF Attitude, Re-Volt, Extreme-G, Vexx, Fur Fighters, Dave Mirra’s Freestyle BMX, and many others, Acclaim finally throws in the towel. After its multiple comebacks, all of its ghastly Mary-Kate and Ashley “games,” and the last, gasping hope at re-kindling Turok (once a great series), Acclaim Entertainment filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy in fall 2004, purportedly owing $100 million to its debtors. Nobody, not even Acclaim employees, weep a single tear.

2004: EA Buys NFL License, Kills NFL 2K Series

In a move that crushed the healthy competition between annual football developers EA and Visual Concepts (and football-based videogames in general), EA out-bought its competition. EA convinced the NFL to an exclusive five-year licensing deal granting the Redwood Shores publisher the sole rights to the NFL’s teams, stadiums, and players. The move followed Visual Concepts/Take-Two’s risky move to sell its game at just $19.99, undercutting EA’s Madden sales with a superior game at a lower price. EA went on to produce three years of substandard Madden games in the new generation of systems, proving true the adage that competition is healthy for any market.

The Fall of 2004: Heavyweight Sequels Reign Supreme

The year 2004 was one of the greatest all-encompassing creative achievements for the game industry. In the fall of 2004, heavyweight games were in abundance and every system had its killer-app lined up. After an alleged security breach forced developer Valve to stall the release of Half-Life 2 in 2003, the Seattle-based developer delivered the wildly popular sequel on the PC in fall 2004, garnering dozens of high scores and game-of-the-year awards. Bungie followed up its first Xbox success story with Halo 2 to high scores, incredible sales, and a technologically advanced online system that revolutionized console multiplayer games. Rockstar Games brought its biggest, grimmest (and subsequently most controversial) game in the Grand Theft Auto series, GTA San Andreas. GTA San Andreas brought in the highest ratings and sales for the franchise, but also produced the hidden Hot Coffee sex scenario that caused characters like Jack Thompson to have their day in the sun (you know, before he lost his license to practice, soon thereafter). While these titles initially garnered the lion’s share of press, awards, and sales, Blizzard’s World of Warcraft silently took over the PC, wooing millions of casual gamers to subscribe to its highly addictive MMORPG, which went on to become the most successful MMORPG ever.

November 21, 2004: Nintendo launches the DS

Ever marching to its own drum beat, Nintendo launches the dual screen (DS) handheld, a modern new take on the Game Boy, which doesn’t instantly take off. It wasn’t until Brain Age and Nintendogs were gobbled up like candy in Japan, Europe, and North America did the system surpass sales of major consoles.

Skimming through Destructoid today I saw this article, “Kojima notes pressure to create new Metal Gear,” and I couldn’t agree more with the author, Jim Sterling.

Citing Develop magazine, Kojima says, “Yeah, there’s absolutely pressure there. Maybe if I quit Konami that pressure might be a bit better, but since Konami handles the business side of our operations, yeah, there’s definitely a demand continue a series as successful as Metal Gear.”

Sterling says, Back on the subject of pressure, I think most hardcore Kojima fans would actually be desperate to see him try something new. I know I’ve been eager to watch him strike out from the MGS series for a while now.”

Aside from Zone of the Enders, Kojima hasn’t really left the Metal Gear stage with anything major or substantial since his little solar invention, Boktai. I would love to see him explore DLC games, other genres, and Wii games. Shoot anything, actually. If Hideo Kojima struck out and left Konami to pursue his own studio, from my perspective, who wouldn’t want to work with him? I’m sure Microsoft would go nuts and over-fund his first project. Look what they did with Hironobu Sakaguchi ‘s Mistwalker studio.

What happened after N64’s launch? What happened with third-part support? What ultimately happened to the Nintendo 64?

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With the wildly successful Nintendo DS and Wii hitting record sales month after month, Nintendo looks like a million bucks. All of Nintendo’s well calculated strategies and inventive risks look like–and may very well be–genius.

Going against the grain of more sophisticated machines such as the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, in 2006 Nintendo launched the Wii, a console less powerful than the original Xbox, accompanied by an un-tried game controller that smacked of trickery, and a name that sounded so close to urine that it made everyone over 10 years of age giggle.

But it wasn’t always that way.

“Looking Back at 1998: Nintendo’s Fall, Part 2” is the second part of a series originally published on Edge-Online.com.

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“Something is Wrong with Nintendo 64”

In the May 1997 issue of Next Generation (number 29, Volume 3), eight months after Nintendo’s successful launch with only two games, Next Generation magazine took a hard look at Nintendo’s system with the headline, “Something is Wrong with Nintendo 64,” followed by the subhead, “There simply aren’t enough quality games. But is there hope? Revealed: The 70 new games that will make or break N64.”

Those words were tough for Nintendo fans to face, but the cover image was even more jarring. It was illustrated with a picture of Mario’s face beneath a cracked plate of glass, splintering Mario’s smiling face into shards.

The basic premise of Next Generation’s feature article was Nintendo had promised “quality” ahead of “quantity,” but didn’t support that strategy with enough quality games. Additionally, the magazine wrote that the games that had arrived were:

3) “And had all the flaws of cartridge-based games” (the lack of storage produced redundant textures, little to no FMV, and significant audio limitations).

4) NG also claimed that while Nintendo made a big deal about the power of 64-bit games over 32-bit games, “outside of Super Mario 64 and Wave Race 64, that extra power hadn’t meant squat to the quality of games. “

5) Finally, Next Generation claimed that there was “no third-party support.”

After two years of working at Next Generation, I headed up the first IGN site, N64.com, which launched in August 1996. The publisher of Next Generation Jonathan Simpson-Bint had given me the option to work on any of the IGN sites, and I had originally picked SaturnWorld.com. After some reflection, I decided to run the N64 site instead, shifting newly hired editor, Jeff Chen, to the Saturn site.

As the new editor at N64.com, I was conflicted. I took issue with Next Generation. Mainly, I disagreed with Next Generation’s review scores. The magazine had only given two Nintendo 64 games, Super Mario 64 and PilotWings 64, five out of five stars. Everything else was ravaged. Wave Race 64 received three stars? Wave Race 64 remains a brilliant piece of technology and gameplay even today. Despite a slew of jet ski games ushered out on PS2, none have been as good as Wave Race. Even the sequel Wave Race: Blue Storm wasn’t better the original. Turok: Dinosaur Hunter received only three stars? Didn’t that game have the coolest set of weapons ever? Even Mario Kart 64 received three stars.

The conflict, however, was that even if I didn’t agree with Next Generation on a game-by-game basis, I agreed with Next Generation’s premise on the whole. On the whole, third-party games were lackluster, old, and safe. It wasn’t until one-plus year after launch that EA started supporting N64. And the 64-bit console’s power wasn’t vastly ahead of the competition, by any means.

All of my issues aside, the magazine’s criticisms pointed out N64’s biggest flaw: the cartridge model was already a thing of the past.

The Medium Is the Message

“Numerous motivational factors explain why the third-part lineup thus far excels only in predictability,” reads Next Generation number 29, Volume 3. “One reason is directly linked to the Nintendo 64 business model which takes away a great deal of the profit potential for a third-party developer. Used to paying approximately $15 per disc for PlayStation, Saturn, and PC games, gamers pay about $35 for Nintendo cartridges and publishers must consider this carefully when planning games for the system.”

“‘From an inventory risk standpoint, we prefer working on CD platforms,’ admits Virgin Games’s Neil Young (in NG 29), which is part of the reason why Virgin is only developing one Nintendo 64 product as opposed to a number of games for competing CD-ROM systems. The bottom line is that when third parties have to pay Nintendo $35 up front for all the games they want to make, it requires a huge financial gamble.”

What happened to Battle Sport II and Contra 64? Why did we get Clay Fighter 63 1/3 and Dark Rift instead?

As we now know, Sony’s PlayStation usurped Nintendo as the market leader partially by wooing developers off Nintendo’s cartridge-based ideology. Developers and publishers alike were attracted to the possibilities of the CD-ROM, which provided more storage versus Nintendo’s cartridge storage capabilities, not to mention more flexible, less risky production scheduling. Publishers could store more video, art, and texture work required in the emerging 3D world of gaming on a CD than on a cartridge. And Nintendo’s rejection of the new technology (or at the very least misinterpretation of its power) played a major role in its stumble from the top.

Equally important to publishers were the economic issues involved with cartridges. There was no doubt in the mind of any smart executive that Nintendo would continue to be successful. Nobody had misgivings about the strength, brilliance, or popularity of Nintendo’s first-party games. Those would come and they would be great. Potentially they would open up sales, markets, and opportunities for third parties as well. Potentially.

How fun was Virgin's Freak Boy--a character that could turn into any weapon, instead of carrying it? And what is this, Ubisoft? Ed?

But the cartridge business all of a sudden looked riskier and far more expensive in comparison to the CD-ROM business. With cartridges–essentially individual chip sets plugged into the console–publishers had to guess how many cartridges to make in advance of the game’s release.

As many publishers had experienced with the NES and Super NES, guessing wrong on precise numbers (500,000 versus 900,000 units, for instance) could backfire in at least two ways. If they guessed short, they would have to queue up again to make more and potentially wait behind other publishers waiting to have their cartridges manufactured–and potentially lose sales during the waiting time. Publishers could miss the Christmas rush entirely if they guessed wrong.

Kirby Bowl transforms into Kirby's Air Ride. And of course, there is Mah Jong Master, wihch always threatened to arrive...

But if publishers guessed long and ordered too many, and customers didn’t buy as many as they had estimated, they would be stuck with extra, expensive cartridges. You always hear the real-life moral tale of Atari’s ET cartridges buried somewhere in the desert, but there is truth in that tale for all cartridge-based publishers. What do you do with thousands of pre-ordered cartridges that don’t sell? You could take Braid designer Jonathan Blow’s advice–to start at point zero and make a good game–but that’s easier said than done.

The PlayStation also touted 3D games with a hardware engine designed to create polygons and texture maps, not sprites. The Saturn, for instance, was a great sprite generating machine, and while the Nintendo 64 had serious power at the time, its storage and RAM limitations hampered the expanding demands gamers and developers were placing on better graphics and sound.

“[With CD-ROMs] publishers could provide more content without paying gigantic prices for memory,” explained Mike Mika, currently head of development at Other Ocean, and then soon-to-be associate editor at Next Generation. “No matter what size your game was, it was still just a single fixed cost. For Nintendo, you had a variety of cartridge sizes that became cost prohibitive very quickly. So you saw a lot of developers and publishers move to some exclusivity on PlayStation.”

Next Generation’s final argument in issue 29 crystallized the problem.

F-Zero, Zelda, and SIlicon Valley made it to N64, and all in great shape.

“Many software publishers are still smarting from huge losses on unsold cartridge games at the end of the 16-bit era, and the last thing they want to do is take another financial bath. So this means that no one wants to take any chances. Third parties will release only the safest, sure-fire winners for N64. And this, (when cemented by Nintendo’s demands for exclusivity which removes any profits from other versions) means tried-and-trusted no-brainer game recipes, big licenses, coin-op conversions–and a resounding ‘snore’ from experienced gamers.”

Square and the Third Party Problem

Squaresoft and Enix were two of the biggest RPG-making companies in Japan. On all visible fronts, both looked like staunch Nintendo supporters with Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest having sold millions of copies in Japan, Europe, and North America on Nintendo’s previous systems.

While Square and Enix originally had stated they would support Nintendo’s system, in retrospect those statements proved differently. It was more than significant to see Square and Enix embrace the PlayStation and then quietly and politely distance themselves from Nintendo’s N64.

The biggest example was when Squaresoft’s Final Fantasy VII arrived on PlayStation in 1997. Sony Computer Entertainment America, which published the game in the U.S., proved its knack for marketing by positioning Final Fantasy VII as an action game in its TV commercials.The game, however, was anything but. Final Fantasy VII was a vast turn-based RPG with what seemed like hours of animated CG cutscenes. At the time, Squaresoft’s RPG was a remarkable visually stunning, and epic game. It sold millions of copies on PlayStation. If you were system agnostic, you bought your PlayStation and you were too were delighted. But to any Nintendo purist, Square’s FFVII on PlayStation felt like betrayal.

“The move by Square to CDs was very significant,” said Chris Charla, currently the VP of business development at Foundation 9 Entertainment, and former Editor-in-Chief of Next Generation Magazine. “First, it gave us a hint that Sony’s system might have some staying power… Seriously, it was really the ultimate seal of approval for optical media in games, and of course it marked a shift by third parties towards PlayStation as the system of choice.”

“It really made people understand what CD offered over cartridge,” added Mika. “There was no way that Nintendo could compete with the imagery and animation that Square put into Final Fantasy VII. People who were just starting to wake up to the next generation of gaming would look at FFVII and Zelda and see that FFVII was just simply a higher impact visually. It was in effect the better ‘book cover.’ And as far as marketing goes, that’s what you need to win people over. It looked better in commercials, screenshots, etc. Its brilliant use of FMV combined with real-time 3D was stunning.”

Brilliance and the Slow Decline

In winter 1997, early hardware and software sales figures indicated that despite Nintendo’s late entry into the marketplace with the Nintendo 64 (Nintendo switched the name from Ultra 64 many months after the Shoshinkai Exposition), the Redmond, Washington-based company had come out fighting.

According to TRST data (The Toy Retail Tracking System), an independent tracker of software sales, six of the 1996 holiday season’s best selling titles were Nintendo 64 titles. Those games included the season’s number one selling game, Super Mario 64, Star Wars Shadows of the Empire (#3), Killer Instinct Gold (#5), Cruis’n USA (#6), Wave Race 64 (#8), and Mortal Kombat Trilogy (#9). Super NES games Donkey Kong Country 2 and Donkey Kong Country 3 also made the top 10, leaving one Saturn and one PlayStation game in the top 10.

As Nintendo’s system built momentum, there were some key third-party titles: Konami’s International Superstar Soccer (AKA Pro Evolution or Winning 11), Midway’s Top Gear Rally, and a few others. Several elements kept N64 relatively close in the market race, but third-party support and consistent quality games were rarely part of the equation.

Second-party developer Rare, however, emerged into a powerhouse force during the N64 years. Best known for early hits Battletoads and Jetpac, and Super NES hits Donkey Kong Country 2 and 3, Rare hit its stride with N64, producing creative hits such as Blast Corps, breaking movie-game stereotypes with the first genuinely good console first-person shooter, GoldenEye 007, and producing clutch games such as Diddy Kong Racing for the otherwise empty Christmas holiday of 1997. Additional Rare hits included Donkey Kong 64, Jet Force Gemini, Perfect Dark, and what many critics consider Rare’s best game, Conker’s Bad Fur Day.

Ocean didn't want us to reveal that Mission Impossible's lead character had a face that merged John Travolta's and Tom Cruise's, due to Cruise's refusal to use his likeness in the game.

The supreme irony of Nintendo 64’s decline in sales and support was that Shigeru Miyamoto’s most transforming, innovative, and visionary work was done on N64. Today, Super Mario 64 remains one of the greatest games ever because of Miyamoto’s ability to successfully bring Nintendo’s flagship franchise into the 3D realm while remaining true to the original. In Mario 64, Miyamoto addressed and, in most cases, solved the difficulty that plagued many developers years after–the 3D camera.

Zelda shows us what it means to target with a Z.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was even more visionary. Aside from introducing key innovative mechanics (which are staples in game mechanics today) such as Z-targeting (some might argue this same technique was simultaneously introduced in Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver), and contact sensitive actions, Ocarina of Time evolved story-telling techniques by jumping in time and portraying Link as both a young and grown character. The time-jumping technique also delivered real consequences to earlier actions made in the game. Other clever innovations involved the use of the ocarina. The ocarina had an extraordinary emotional effect on players who had to memorize tunes, which then cast magic on characters and items, enabling Link to progress.

Next Generation called Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time the “game of the century,”‘ under Charla’s editorial direction. Future’s sister publication in England, Edge, in 2007 reported Ocarina of Time as the “best game of all time,” according to its reader poll.

The 64DD did arrive, but in limited supply.

But even Nintendo had problems with how to deliver The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time to its cartridge system. The Bulky Drive, later known as the 64DD, was originally planned as the defacto peripheral on which the game would arrive. But the 64DD (1999) arrived after Ocarina of Time (1998), and never took off. Nintendo, instead, doubled the size of its cartridge to 32 MBs and fit Zelda onto it, the biggest cartridge Nintendo had ever created.

Well before Nintendo 64’s five-year cycle had come to a close, the Nintendo 64, despite an impressive start and significant first- and second party games peppering its lifespan, continued to lose significant market share to Sony while third-party support dropped precipitously. By 1999, when the Dreamcast shipped, even companies like Midway and Acclaim, original members of the “Dream Team,” stopped supporting N64.

Sony’s win with the PlayStation was due to a combination of factors. First, Sony bet on the right storage medium. Equally important, however, was that Sony had earned market leadership by wooing and grooming third-party publishers who created a massive library of games that reached into all genres and sub-genres. It created its own first- and second-party hits such as Gran Turismo, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon, Twisted Metal, JetMoto, and NFL GameDay, to name just a few. But one could question that if Nintendo, despite all its creative strides in software, had picked a different, better technology, the 32-bit generation console wars would have emerged much differently.

Yuke Yuke Troublemakers was a weird a wonderful game, just like all of Treasure's game.

How would Nintendo take these lessons and apply them to its next system, the GameCube? And how would Nintendo build upon Rare’s second-party strategy? And how would technology ultimately be the issue that Nintendo would tackle in a totally unique way? Look for part 3 of “Looking Back: Nintendo’s Fall” soon.

Konami Digital Entertainment showed off 14 new games at its recent gamers night, showcasing four titles to kick off the night: Six Days in Fallujah, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, Saw, and Karaoke Revolution.

Saw is a single-player survival horror game not based on supernatural elements like Silent Hill or Resident Evil.

Most gamers already have heard of Six Days in Fallujah, thanks to the negative reactions to several prominent military members–followed by a parade of news stories with interviews of many more military members who embrace the idea of a game based on the most significant battle on the war in Iraq. In development by Atomic Games (Close Call: First to Fight, V for Victory), the first-person shooter will incorporate the stories of real soldiers who were in the battle of Fallujah. The core of the game is based on those stories and will incorporate them in FMV interviews in the game itself. Atomic Games showed game footage battles in which RPGs blew up massive portions of enemy-occupied buildings. The game boasts full destruction to any and all buildings and structures as a means of progressing through the levels.

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is designed specifically for the Wii controller and featues seamless use of the flash light and a smart phone, shown here.

Saw, the game, is an original game developed by Zombie Inc., which takes place in between the first and second movies, and follows the frightful plight of detective David Trapp as he tries to escape Jigsaw’s asylum of deadly traps and seriously messed up minions.Saw will arrive close to Halloween, following the sixth Saw movie, due by end of October.

Karaoke Revolution offers new customization, 50 master tracks, and online support for additional DLC down the line.

Karaoke Revolution is the millionth game in the series (OK, thousandth), and this version features 50 master tracks, new customizable venues, items, and playlists, and the ability to add pyrotechnics to make your performance all the more flashy. Look for artists including Kelly Clarkson, Talking Heads, Rod Stewart, Cold Play, Incubus, and The All American Rejects to appear among the 50 master tracks.

As a testament to Konami staying close to its musical roots, the Japanese publisher and developer announced today Karaoke Revolution for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Nintendo Wii.

Due in fall 2009, the musical enables up to 16 people to play together and features a new level of character custimization, an assortment of flashy pyrotechnics, and 50 master tracks to artists and bands. Popular artists include Kelly Clarkson, Cold Play, Incubus, the All American Rejects, Rod Stewart, and Talking Heads among them.

Karaoke Revolution features a Party mode for 16-players that enables custom set lists and easy jump-in-and-jump-out interactivity. The Career mode should be familiar to anyone who has played a music game before: players compete to unlock 10 new venues (plus six customizable venues) and clothing and accessories.

Another new custom feature enables players to include original music videos in their custom venues and download more music online. Finally, players can use the Xbox Live Vision Camera and PS EyeToy to support online games.

In fall 2007, former publisher Brash Entertainment revealed Saw the videogame, a title based on the five-movie franchise that’s garnered more than $665 million worldwide and sold more than 28 million DVDs. After Brash’s unfortunate demise and a reshuffling of rights, Konami today reveals Saw, the survival horror game, due on PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 in October 2009 (right after the release of Saw 6).

The single-player title follows the narrative of David Trapp, a detective determined to capture the “Jigsaw” serial killer. The game takes place in between the first and second movies, and finds Trapp without a job and mourning the loss of his partner, who was killed by Jigsaw.

During Konami’s game even at Ruby Skye in San Francisco last week, I spoke with John Williamson, producer and designer from Zombie Inc. (Shadow Ops: Red Mercury, Delta Force: Task Force Dagger) and David Daniels, director of marketing, about Saw’s place in the survival horror genre, what hardcore Saw fans can expect to learn from this game, samples of a few achievements and trophies, and the value of a well-tested checkpoint.

Doug Perry: Was this the same game that Brash originally revealed in fall 2007?

David Daniels: We haven’t changed it drastically. The core of the game was in place when we picked the game up from Lionsgate. Because we have such a strong foundation in the survival horror genre–you could say we were one of the pioneer publishers in the genre– we brought our vision to it. We had some things we have changed because Brash has its own vision, and there are some things we brought to it, because we have our own vision. We wanted to keep the game strong with respect to the movie franchise and also we wanted to stay clear of the Silent Hill franchise.

Doug: When you die in this demo, you’re forced to start back at the beginning of the demo. Will the final game play this way?

John Williamson: The demo is pre-alpla. So the checkpoint save wasn’t really working at the point when we created it. Survival horror-type games don’t lend themselves to this kind of environment, you know loud, busy, distracting parties. So we took a lot of the video game elements you’re going to find in the game and compressed them into this demo. That’s why when you have to look for a key, you’re not going to have to look too far for it. This level is the one we use internally to benchmark certain ideas so we can determine how well they work.

Doug: If I had never watched the Saw movies before, but I liked survival horror games, what is the reason I would play this game? I mean, 90% of the movie games created are just plain awful, so why would I buy this game?

John: The game appeals to everyone. Fans of the Saw universe are going to learn more about the Saw world, and the characters and the back story, but it will also attract survival horror fans too, because it takes the genre in a slightly new direction. Survival horror games are traditionally supernatural, and this one isn’t. By removing the supernatural aspect, you’re getting a game based on the here and now; it’s reality based. So if you’re not a hardcore Saw fan, you’re going to like it and probably want to go see the movies and learn more about it.

Doug: So if you’re a Saw fan, what’s the attraction?

John: This game takes place in between Saw 1 and Saw 2 in the movie chronology, so the really hardcore fans who have seen all five of the them and will go see the sixth one, they’ll recognize some of the characters from that time frame. We’re going to answer some questions in that time frame, and expand on characters that were only tangentially mentioned as well as introduce some new characters that fit within that timeframe.

Doug: What did you see in Saw that you liked with regard to the survival horror genre, and what did you fee like rejecting?

John: We went back and played the survival horror games, Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Obscure, Condemned, and we just tried to take all of those lessons and bring them to a non-supernatural venue. This doesn’t focus on the same level of exploration that some of the earlier games had. So it will be one third exploration, which is one of the tent poles of survival horror games, it will be one third puzzles, and one third combat. And the final combat isn’t always direct combat; it’s not always mano-a-mano combat. It’s more about using the environment and using traps against the people that you’re engaged in combat with. So sometimes you want to be on the other side of the door when the timer expires. So it’s combat using exploration to get on the other side of the door before the timer runs out, or you die.

Doug: So how do you feel about checkpoints and things that soften the sense of reality and horror?

John: With checkpoints, you have to balance things. You don’t want to have too many, or it’s easy and you’re less scared. But if you have too few, you’ll become frustrated and quit. So one of the things the team and I worked on is that each time you replay a section, it’s different. So each time you reach the circuit mini-game, it’s different. We randomly rearrange the circuits, the lights, and every time you go through the shotgun door, it’s different. That’s one of the things that frustrates me when playing a game is that I just did it, so I am one step closer. So we add variety. Then later on, you’ll have the option to just skip through that section altogether thanks to a device (that I find later in the game) that enable me to bypass a particular trap.

Doug: Can you tell us about some of the game’s achievements and trophies?

John: We have lots of achievements and trophies: Well, some of them are dependent one how you kill some of the minions, you get them as you complete each level, and we tried to give players a lions share of them by playing just straight through the game, and don’t veer of the path, but you’ll get more for exploring off the beaten path. And if you’re a hardcore Saw fan, you’ll want to explore off the beaten path to find all the little bits and pieces of the back story.